


5 by 5 (5 Times 5 Times)

by Rinkafic



Series: Misc Stargate [4]
Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-07
Updated: 2013-02-07
Packaged: 2017-11-28 13:29:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/674915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rinkafic/pseuds/Rinkafic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a collection of "5 Times" prompts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	5 by 5 (5 Times 5 Times)

**5 Times Someone Figured Out Sam & Vala were a Couple**  
On the Odyssey, with nothing much to do, Vala spent a lot of time playing. She teased Daniel, she pranked Mitchell, she challenged Teal’c to silly competitions that eventually he took her up on because he too was bored.

But Sam was busy. Of the others, only Sam was truly able to put her energies towards finding them a way off their prison, and so Vala respected the space Sam needed, and played with Daniel instead.

One night, Sam felt tired and defeated and like nothing was ever going to come of all her work. Bleary eyed and not paying attention to where she was going, she stumbled out of the control room and down towards the residential cabins.

When Vala opened the door to her repeated pressing of the chime, Sam fell into her arms, she needed this.

Neither of them noticed that General Landry had been coming along the gangway in the other direction.

~*~

Sam’s brother Mark insisted that she come to a barbecue for the 4th of July, Sam had made the mistake of mentioning she did not have plans this year, and was stuck. When she mentioned this, with a slight wrinkle of her nose, at the morning team meeting, Vala noticed and pounced on the opportunity to escape the mountain.

As they walked around the side of the house, Sam took a deep breath in preparation for facing her family. Vala took her by the shoulders, turned her and brushed the hair back from her face, cupping her cheek and looking into her eyes. “You’re fine. Point me at the ones to demolish.” She leaned over and kissed her soundly on the mouth.

There was a clearing of a throat nearby, and they pulled their lips apart and turned their heads, foreheads touching to see Sam’s brother Mark standing on the walkway. “So, uhm, Sam, you brought… a friend.”

~*~

When SG-1 stepped through the Gate, the Hirtoark priests took one look at Sam and Vala, threw up their hands in flailing panic and had them dragged away to be “purified and protected” with the women, much to Jackson’s amusement. It seemed this was a bit of payback for a certain incident with some online shopping.

“I’ll come save you!” Daniel chortled with glee as Vala was tugged kicking and screaming towards the bath house.

The bath house, it turned out, was quite luxurious, quite like an expensive day spa. After being stripped of their ‘ugly ugly man clothes’ and treated to deep tissue oil massages and mud baths, Sam and Vala were shown to one the hot spring pools.

“Hhhm.” Sam hummed as she eyed the steaming water. “This might not be so bad, after all.”

“Indeed.” Vala agreed, dropped her towel and splashed into the water, holding out her arms. With a shrug, Sam threw off her own towel and went to her.

“You don’t understand, I am responsible for them, they ARE my women.” Cam Mitchell said as he forced his way past the bath house attendant into the pool area, drawing up short as he got an eyeful of some very sensual motion in the spa.

An attendant had fetched a supervisor, who screeched and flailed her arms. “Men are not allowed in here!”

Disappointed, Mitchell glanced over his shoulder as he was shoved out of the room and gave a sigh. “Now that is a damned shame.”

~*~

One night, after yet another interaction with Adria, Teal’c found Vala curled in a ball on the couch in the AV room on base, silently sobbing. He touched her shoulder, but she refused to look up at him, she buried her face in her arms and sobbed harder.

“Is there anything that I may do to ease your pain, Vala Mal Doran?”

“Sam. I want Sam. I called her but she wasn’t there.”

Teal’c went to the Control Room and persuaded Harriman to track Samantha’s sub-q transmitter, he called the telemetry lab where she was and intoned into the phone receiver, “Vala Mal Doran is most distressed, she has requested your presence in the audio visual room.”

“Oh, okay. I’ll be right there.”

“I shall remain with her.”

Sam rushed in and immediately went to Vala, gathering her into her arms and rocking her. “Shhh, shhh, baby, I’m sorry, I got distracted.” Sam kissed Vala’s forehead and held her.

Teal’c moved to the doorway, solemnly keeping guard and scaring off any base personnel that attempted to enter the room.

~*~  
Samantha Carter was very willing to admit that she sometimes became a bit engrossed in her work, sometimes to the point of obsession, and sometimes to the point of not noticing what was going on around her.

When Vala Mal Doran was given permission to stay on the base, and go on missions with SG-1, Sam was rather immersed in a problem with the energy output on the Hammond’s star drive, she accepted Vala’s presence and moved on with her work. Since Vala lived on base now, Sam didn’t think it was too odd that Vala brought tea and pastries to Sam’s lab every morning at nine and ate breakfast with her, so Vala didn’t have to eat by herself.

She knew Vala didn’t know too many people that she could leave the base with, so when Vala would come by with tickets for a concert, or a play, or an art showing, Sam smiled and put her current work aside for a few hours and went along. So that Vala wasn’t alone so much.

When Sam got sick with a virus that swept through the base and was laid up in the infirmary, unable to go home, and unable to work, Vala came by and brought Sam a portable DVD player, Season one of Wormhole Extreme, a fluffy robe and cozy slippers and rubbed Sam’s feet until she fell asleep. Every time Sam woke, Vala was there, and Sam wasn’t miserable and alone and sick.

The Ori problem consumed so much of Sam’s time that she contemplated aloud at lunch one day just moving into quarters on base temporarily to save the time of commuting. “You can stay with me.” Vala offered. And since Vala had a huge comfortable bed, and was quite amenable to sharing, Sam said yes. And Vala always had tea and cookies and was waiting up to say good night when Sam came in. Sam didn’t feel quite so lonely anymore.

And when the Ori were defeated, and the celebrations were over on the base, and Sam followed Vala down to her quarters so that she could collect her stuff, Vala turned to Sam and cupped her cheeks and pressed their lips together, softly demanding without words that Sam stay. And Sam realized that she hadn’t been alone for quite a while.

***************************

**5 Futures that Didn't Come to Pass**  
 **Imprisonment**  
“Hallowed are the Ori!” 

“I’m not saying that, Daniel, no matter how many times you repeat it. You can go f…” 

“Hallowed are the Ori, it is a very simple phrase that will save your life Mitchell. Accept the truth. Accept Origin. Then I will release your chains and you shall be free. You need not remain imprisoned.” 

“You and the rest of your pasty, bug eyed, Kool-aid drinking cronies can take Origin and shove it up your collective asses.” 

“You could have had a good life.” 

“I had a good life, Daniel, until you went traitor and gave the bad guys the keys to the city.” 

“Hallowed are the Ori.” 

“Oh, not this again. Screw this, just light the fire already. You already killed the rest of my team, why am I drawing this out?” 

“Hallowed are the Ori.” 

 

**Hostages**  
“This is Ladon Radim of the Genii, to whom am I speaking?” 

“Colonel Sheppard, Radim. What do you want?” 

“A trade.” 

“We have enough tava beans for now, thanks so much for calling, bye-bye now.” 

“The lives of Teyla Emmagen and Ronon Dex.” 

“I’m listening.” 

“We’ve been cut off by the Coalition, in part thanks to the interference of your Mister Woolsey. We need medical assistance, we’ve a plague outbreak.” 

“I don’t make deals with terrorists, Radim, you should know that by now.” 

“You would not listen. This was the only way.” 

“Let Teyla and Ronon go, then we’ll talk.” 

“We shall redial and send them through, perhaps then you will be prepared to deal.”

“Col… Sheppard! Do not… we … infected … no cure… trap…” 

“Teyla? Teyla. Radim, let her talk!” 

“The time for talking is over, Sheppard.” 

“So is this conversation. Chuck, lock the address for the Genii homeworld out of the database.” 

 

**Unconsciousness**  
They said that when you were in stasis, you didn’t dream. They were wrong. TJ knew she was dreaming. The passing of time was fluid, meaningless. She floated, drifting, touching a memory here, a dream there. Images from her childhood, of happy times came to her. She liked those; she drifted through those again and again when she found them. The sad, the bad, the mad, she pushed those aside. She was also vaguely aware of the thrum of the ship around her. She was warm, she felt warm. It was good. She was comfortable. She was safe. 

And then suddenly, she was cold. She toppled forward, against a warm body. 

“Easy, I’ve got you. You’re safe.” She looked up into Varro’s eyes. 

“You took a while coming out of it.” TJ looked around; her crewmates were milling around or sitting on the floor, their stasis units open and dark, shut down. 

“Where are we? Did it work?” 

“Yes, and no.” Varro tossed his head and she leaned around to look past him. 

“Oh,” she whispered. At the end of the corridor, with what were obviously weapons pointed in their directions, six insectoid aliens stood, guarding or watching them. 

“Good guys or bad guys?” TJ whispered to the former Lucian Alliance operative. “We haven’t figured that out yet. They boarded and shut down the stasis units, they haven’t made any demands yet.” 

“This isn’t how it was supposed to go.” 

“No. But things seldom go according to plan, do they?” One of the aliens held up a device in a claw, waving it around at the wakened crew of the Destiny. It chittered as it waved the device in TJ’s direction. Then it came forward towards her. She backed away slowly, Varro keeping pace with her as he held her arm. 

The overhead intercom crackled and Colonel Young’s voice boomed out, “TJ, don’t fight them. They claim they’re going to help us. They’re scanning for our sick and injured now. Go with them, they say they can help.”   
Could they? Could these alien bugs possibly have a cure for her ALS? She pressed her lips together and nodded stiffly at Varro. He followed as she took a step towards the giant bug. If this was the chance she had prayed for, she should take it, shouldn’t she? 

 

**Emotion Play**  
Ba’al looked to his right, at his queen, and smiled. She was his now, body and soul. Well, most of her body and soul. He frowned slightly. He didn’t like that last bit of resistance, no matter how small. 

“Antoore, my love, my darling queen, would you grant me a boon?” 

She turned to look at him and smiled. “Why of course, my love. But whatever could I give to you that you don’t already have? You have the Tau’ri on their knees in bondage, you’ve the jaffa brought to heel once more and the troublesome rebels put to the sword, and you’ve all the riches of the fallen System Lords in your coffers. What have I to offer?” 

“I wish to speak with your host.” 

“Oh. Again?” 

“Just for a short time, my little love.” 

“Very well. I do not know why you find such fascination in tormenting the wretched creature.” The golden eyes closed and then were blue. Fawning devotion turned to abject hatred in an instant. Ba’al smiled. This was better. He liked the fire. He leaned over and kissed her lips. She turned and spat. 

“I will kill you.” 

“No, I think not. How would you get away, Samantha? I took your legs, remember?” 

She looked down at her useless injured legs. “How could I forget?” 

“My Queen has no need to walk, she can be carried. She need only sit the throne at my side.” 

“I will kill you.” 

“And how will you get away.” Ba’al laughed and chucked her under the chin. 

She hissed, “I don’t need to get away, if it is the last thing I ever do, I will see you ended, Ba’al.” 

He waved a hand at her. “Beg me for Jack O’Neill’s life.” 

She blinked and leaned away, staring at him. “Jack’s not dead?” 

“Beg me for his life.” Ba’al leaned forward resting one elbow on the armrest ofhis throne. 

“What do I have to do to save Jack?” 

“What would you do? Would you let me bed you? Would you willingly remain host to Antoore?” 

She clenched her teeth and after a moment she nodded. “If that is what it takes.” 

He smiled, thrilled with her answer. Then he clucked his tongue and shook his head. “Too bad. I’ve already killed him. But it is lovely to know the lengths you would go to.” 

She cried out and aunched herself at him, trying to claw at his eyes. But with her legs ruined and unable to support her, she fell to the floor at his feet instead. When she looked up at him with misery in her eyes, he smiled. 

He got up and stepped over her, bending to pat her head before he strolled away. He called back over his shoulder, “I don’t need your cooperation, you know. Antoore, I’m finished for today, you may take back what is yours. Guard, come and help your Queen back to her throne.” 

 

**Love Spell**  
"But what does it do?” Wendy Lorne had always been very curious, but not curious enough to do the reading herself. She poked at the device in front of her as her younger brother David scrolled through the pages of the Ancient text they had found with the device.

“From what I can decipher, it’s a component of a romantic emotion escalator,” David wrinkled his nose and looked at the device again. 

She tilted her head and blinked at him for a moment before she translated what he had said. “A love potion maker!” 

“It is not! I didn't say that.” Her romantic teenaged heart wasn’t letting go of the idea, not now. 

“How does it work?” 

“You are not using this thing, Wendy!” 

“Stop me, tattle tale. I didn’t tell Dad about the chair room.” 

“No fair. Look, Wendy, it wouldn’t be right.” 

“He won’t look at me otherwise, not with Reyna Dex strutting her pretty ass all over the city. How can I compete with her, or with Megan Sheppard? I can’t.” 

“Mistaaaakkkeeee!” David said in a singsong voice as his sister grabbed up the device and pressed the button. “Wendy…” 

She pressed the button as she chanted, “Torren, Torren, Torren.”

~*~ 

“Daddy?” Cam Mitchell looked up to see David standing in the doorway, toeing the carpet. Rolling his eyes, since he knew that look and what it meant, he closed down his computer and sighed heavily. 

“What did you guys do now?” 

“Wendy touched this Ancient thing. I told her not to… she’s in the infirmary, Dad is with her.” Before his son finished, Cam was up out of his chair and heading towards the door. He grabbed David’s elbow and towed him along. They arrived to see Wendy sitting on an exam table, rocking back and forth with a dreamy look in her eyes as Carson Beckett waved a gadget over her. 

“Carson, what’s wrong with her?” 

“Well, the best I can tell, General, she’s … well… stoned.” 

“Stoned?” 

“Aye. She triggered an overload of hormones and endorphins. A teenaged body is just chock full of them and she’s just overdosed.” 

Evan rolled his eyes and shook his head as Cam moved to stand beside him. “What can you do about it, Doc?” 

“Well, gentlemen, I think she’ll come down on her own. She’s not suffering, that’s for certain. I’ll just keep her here until it wears off. 

Her levels are already down a wee bit from the time she came in.” Cam pointed a finger at Wendy’s nose. “You are so grounded, young lady!” 

“Hi Daddy!” Wendy giggled and nipped at his fingertip. 

“So very grounded,” Evan agreed.

*****************************************

**5 Bedtime Stories for Torren**  
 **Lorne/Parrish: S is for Storytime**  
“Once upon a time there was a crazy, long-haired hippy dude that loved plants and flowers, especially his bulbyfillhim barbie gums, even more than he loved people.”

“Bulbophyllum barbigerum. Evan, what are you telling the baby?”

“Teyla said to tell him a bedtime story, so I’m telling him a bedtime story.”

“Tell him a real story.”

“This is a real story, it’s totally real. Now stop interrupting me and let me tell Torren the story.”

“What does he know about hippies or orchids?”

“He doesn’t even walk yet, what does he know about frogs or princesses or dragons either? Shut up, I’m making this up as I go.”

“No need to be rude, Major.”

“Who invited themselves along? Huh, Torren, who wanted to come? I’ll tell you who, Mister Orchid-Loving Critic pants, that’s who.”

“How long are you going to stay mad?”

“Forever. Now Torren, the crazy botany guy was as blind as a bat and couldn’t see things that were right in front of him, unless they had roots or leaves or bulbs or flowers. He was mean to everyone around him, ignoring them all the time and not doing the things he promised to do. One by one all the people went away out of his life until he was all by himself and he was a very lonely man.”

“You’re being an asshole.”

“Don’t curse in front of the baby, Parrish. Why did you come, anyway? You hardly know Teyla and you don’t like kids.”

“I like you.”

“No you don’t. You don’t like anyone except your plants.”

“I. Like. You.”

“Let go of me or I’ll punch you, David.”

“No violence in front of the baby. C’mon, I said I was sorry. I like you, Evan, a lot.”

“Mffff, no making out in front of the baby either. And I haven’t forgiven you. Go sit over there. I’m telling Torren a story.”

“Start over.”

“No, I like the orchid loving hippy story. Hey, phew! Is that you, kid? Dang, Torren, you’ve got a stinky butt! Hey Parrish, you wanna make it up to me?”

“I am not changing a dirty diaper.”

“So the mean, inconsiderate botany guy...”

“Botanist, use the proper title.”

“Doctor Snobby looked around one day and found that there was no one to share his orchids with. All of the people that might have cared about his work had gone away and he hadn’t even noticed.”

“I noticed, I’m sorry. You are not letting this go, are you?”

“There we go, Torren, all fresh and clean. Now, if we were monkeys that lived in trees, we might take this opportunity to throw this poop at someone that might be bothering us.”

“Don’t you dare!”

“But as we are not monkeys, we won’t do that. One day, as Doctor Snobby was working in his very lonely greenhouse, by himself, all alone, with no one to help him...”

“Point. Get on with it. Your audience is going to sleep.”

“He is not, look, he’s watching me. He hasn’t had his bottle yet.”

“I meant me.”

“So one day, there was a knock on the door and a painter was standing there, holding his easel and paints and a blank white canvas. ‘I heard you have beautiful orchids. May I please paint them?’ he asked. What do you think happened, Torren? Do you think Doctor Snobby had learned his lesson? Or do you think he sent the painter away?”

“I think he invited the painter in. And then he showed him where his favorite and most beautiful orchid was growing. And while the painter worked, he brought him lemonade and ginger snaps and he complimented the painting.”

“Hhhmm. Sounds okay by me. I think Torren approves too.”

“And then, after the painting is done, the botanist will take the painter home and show him how sorry he was for being mean and he would spend the whole night making it up to him.”

“By watching cheesy sci-fi movies.”

“But no Godzilla.”

“With foot massages.”

“Fine, with foot massages.”

“And a bubble bath.”

“You’re pushing it, Evan.”

~*~

**Jennifer Keller: Little Hands**  
Jennifer shuffled nervously from foot to foot as she waited for Teyla or Kanan to answer the door. She had never done anything like this before, she had always been too busy with her school work to babysit when she was a teenager. Her father had been generous with her allowance, she hadn’t needed to mind other people’s kids for her pocket money. 

AG-1 was invited to a big feast at one of their trading partners, and Teyla needed someone to mind Torren overnight because many of the Athosians were attending, including the friends that usually minded Torren. Since it was her night off, Jennifer had volunteered impulsively when the crisis had been mentioned at lunch the day before. 

The door opened and Torren was smiling up at her. “Hi!”

“Hi!”

“Hello Jennifer, come in!” Kanan called. He was fastening the straps of a carrying bag. “We are very happy that you will be visiting with Torren tonight.

Torren bounded over the floor cushions, stumbled, fell and rolled to land on his knees. he giggled and looked up at Jennifer. “Do you know any games?”

She reached into her shoulder bag and pulled out a long thin box. “I brought Jenga.” He scrambled up to look at the colorful box and nodded in approval. It had not been easy finding a game in the rec hall suitable for a four year old to play. 

When Teyla came in from the other room, she smiled in welcome. “Torren is very excited to have you visit.” It sounded so much nicer the way they put it, visiting instead of babysitting. She felt like she was Torren’s guest. 

“He likes stories of any kind, especially Earth stories. I have told him to be polite and mind his table manners when you go to have breakfast in the mess hall,” Teyla said as she kissed Torren’s cheek and smoothed his hair back. 

There were hugs and kisses and then they were gone and Jennifer was left alone with the little boy. Luckily, he knew what to do with his “guest” and he led her to a small table and they spent a good long while playing with the Jenga blocks. 

“Will you tell me a story, Jennifer?” Torren had been delighted when she had invited him to call her Jennifer instead of Doctor Keller. He took her by the hand and led her to the huge pile of cushions that served as a sofa of sorts for the family. 

“Sure, what kind of story?”

“Tell me one that you liked when you were little.”

Sheppard had told her that he usually told Torren the plots of movies and cartoons he remembered as a kid. That started a discussion at the table of what movies John was not allowed to tell Torren about. It had been amusing to watch Sheppard pout when Teyla put the kibosh on any horror movies until Torren was much older.

Cuddling up next to Torren, she tried to think back to the stories she had liked. “Would you like to hear a story my mother used to tell me?” It was one of the few she remembered her mother telling her before she had died. 

“Once upon a time - and all the best stories begin like that Torren - there was a lonely little girl who lived in tiny cottage in a great forest.”

“Why was she lonely?”

“Because her mama and papa had died and gone to heaven and the creatures of the forest that had once been her friends had all begun to disappear, one by one.”

“Oh. What was happening to her friends?”

Jennifer smiled. “Well that was what Cara wanted to find out. She missed her friends very much. So, one day in the summer, she packed some food and her clothing and her favorite blanket into a rucksack and set out to look for the animals that had disappeared.”

“I would have taken my favorite blanket too.” 

“Yes, I thought you might. Cara wanted to check one last time to see if her friends had returned. She walked to the stream, but she didn’t find frog or turtle that lived there. She went to the great tree but did not find blue bird or squirrel or chipmunk that all shared the tree as their home. She went to the bramble hedge, but the deer were gone. Lastly, she went to the big cave at the edge of the forest.”

“Caves are dangerous,” Torren intoned seriously.

“Yes, they can be, if you are not very careful. Cara lit a candle that she had brought with her and went a short way into the cave. ‘Hello!’ she called, but brown bear did not answer. All of her friends had gone away. She went to the path and began to walk to the far side of the forest. It was very quiet, there were no animal noises or bird songs, not even the buzzing of a bug.

“Because it had been so quiet, when there finally was a noise, it carried very far to reach Cara’s ears. She paused in her walk and listened. It was an odd noise, like none she had ever heard before.”

Torren looked up at her and asked, “What kind of noise, what did it sound like?” 

“It was a sound no human could ever hope to make. The sound of all the animals of the forest, crying out at once. Cara ran towards it, heedless of the danger. She came to a clearing and within it was a giant wagon, with wheels as tall as brown bear. The red walls of the wagon had small barred openings all the way around the top. Through the openings, she heard the calls of her animal friends.

“Cara ran around and around the wagon, but she could not see how to open it. Suddenly, the calls from within stopped. Then she heard the sound of footsteps coming. A man as tall as the trees appeared. He looked cruel and mean and he carried a net in his hands that was big enough to scoop up brown bear. In the net, Cara saw the rarest of all the animals, the king of the wood, a unicorn. The giant man was humming to himself as he went to the wagon and opened the side and pushed the unicorn out of his net and into the wagon with the rest of the animals. ‘Ha, ha, ha’ he said in a great booming voice, ‘now my collection is complete and I can go home to my castle in the sky.’ This made Cara very sad and worried. How could a tiny person like her hope to stop a giant?”

“Was it a city ship in the sky like Atlantis?”

Jennifer ruffled his hair. “No one knows because no one has ever gone to the giant’s home and returned to tell the tale. Well, there was one boy, named Jack, but that is another story.

“Now, the giant had to make preparations to lift the wagon up to the sky castle. Cara watched him and saw that he climbed up a giant tree that disappeared into the clouds. She could never hope to chop such a tree down, her arms were not strong enough. But even the biggest tree in the forest could not withstand fire.”

“But fire would burn the whole forest!” Torren exclaimed. Jennifer smiled, he was a clever boym she had never realized that as a child when her mother told her the story.

“Yes, you’re right, torren, it would. But Cara lived in a time and place where even little girls and little boys knew some magic. She drew a magic circle around the tree and then set a fire, which she also used a little magic song to help along. Soon, the giant tree was in flames, giant flames that reached to the sky. Cara heard the giant man roaring in anger up above when he found that his way back to his collection had been burned away.

“Now that Cara knew how the wagon opened, she was able to figure out where the latch was, and using a stick, she opened it. The animals poured out, all very happy to see her. They thanked her as they passed by and ran off to return to their homes. It was a great distance for her small friends frog and turtle, so she put them in her pockets to carry them home with her. She waved to brown bear as he loped away towards his cave, it was always a good idea to keep a respectable distance from brown bear. 

As Cara started the long walk to her tiny cottage, she heard the sound of hooves coming up behind her and she stopped and turned back. Unicorn knelt beside her and offered his back for the long journey across the forest, as his thanks for saving all the creatures of the forest.

“From that day on, Cara was not lonely. The unicorn stayed with her until she was a grown woman and did not need him any more.”

Torren’s eyes were growing heavy. Jennifer checked her watch, it was his bedtime. “There is a moral to the story, would you like to hear it?” He nodded sleepily. “My mother told me that there is great power, even in little hands.”

~*~

**Ronon: Mama Sang**  
Teyla had not expected to enjoy motherhood as much as she had thus far. Torren was a joy that she could not have anticipated. Everyday he brought something new into her life. She and Kanaan had fallen into a comfortable relationship, parenthood suited him and they worked well together. She was quite happy and content, so much so that when she learned that she was to have another child, she was very pleased and planned a special getaway to the mainland to tell Kanaan the news.

When she asked Ronon if he would come and watch over Torren, the former runner had been a little reluctant, but had agreed when Teyla told him that Torren would be bathed and already in bed by the time she and Kanaan were to leave for their moonlit picnic. 

Torren might have been in bed, but he wasn’t asleep. Teyla almost cancelled the plans when she saw Ronon’s panicked look, but then her friend had ushered them out the door insisting everything would be fine.

~*~

“You’re supposed to be asleep,” Ronon said gruffly to the small boy sitting up in the bed with a stuffed dog under one arm.

“Not sleepy,” Torren replied stubbornly. “Tell me a story.”

Ronon picked up the chair beside the bed and spun it around, straddling it and propping his elbows on the backrest. He thought about the stories he knew, but most were more suitable for taverns and locker rooms than for sending recalcitrant little boys off to sleep. “What kind of story?” he asked, stalling for time.

“When you were little like me.”

“I was never little like you, I was always big,” Ronon grinned at him.

“You were not. Mama said everyone was a baby one, even you. She said when you were little you lived on Sateera.”

“Sateda. Yeah, I was a baby once. But I was a big baby. My mother said I was the biggest baby that was ever born in our district.”

“Did your mama sing to you? My mama sings to me.”

He closed his eyes, allowing himself to remember his mother. Warm brown eyes, long sandy brown hair, soft and gentle hands that soothed away his hurts. She’d had a laugh that was quick to come and always cheered him. And her voice; like Teyla his mama had possessed a voice worthy of singing the praises of the gods. He opened his eyes and looked at the boy. “She sang,” he answered.

“Can you sing what she sang? I want to hear.”

Ronon cleared his throat and tried to remember the words and melody. He tried to translate into English as he went. 

_“Sleep, my child, for dawn comes soon._  
There are so many adventures for you in the day.   
Sleep my child, I shall be here.   
Mother shall guard you in the night.   
Sleep my child, mother loves you, sleep, sleep, sleep. 

“My mother sang it a lot better,” Ronon said, but Torren smiled at him and snuggled down with his stuffed toy. 

After yawning, Torren asked, “Can I meet your mama?”

“Someday, when you go to join the Ancestors.” Ronon looked at the small shelf beside the bed and found a storybook. He picked it up and opened the cover and began to read an Earth story about talking toys. He stopped, relieved to be done, when he saw that Torren had nodded off. 

Before leaving the room, he adjusted the blanket and turned the lights off. There was a small night light beside the bed and he smiled in memory of the light his mother used to leave burning for him.

**Sheppard/McKay: Borrowing Black**  
“You’re up, Sheppard. He wants to hear a story,” McKay came out of the bedroom and jerked a thumb over his shoulder. 

John rolled his eyes. “You couldn’t tell him a story?”

“I tried, apparently the Little Quantum Singularity that Could is a giant failure with the Athosian under ten set.” McKay picked up his abandoned bowl of popcorn from the table and threw himself down on the sofa. 

“You suck,” John swatted his shoulder and gave up his comfortable position. He hit the power button on the DVD, “Don’t watch without me, I waited for you.”

“No horror stories, you know how Teyla feels about those!” Rodney chortled over his shoulder as he reminded John of the moratorium. As if John could forget, Teyla had specifically made a point to remind him on ther way out the door. 

“Hey kiddo,” John said as he went into Torren’s bedroom. The decor was a weird mash-up of Earth culture and Athosian, the boy really was a product of both societies. 

“Hi John. Rodney’s stories suck, tell me one please. A scary one! With blood.”

“Don’t say suck.” 

“You say it all the time.”

“I’m big, you’re little, don’t say it.” He rubbed Torren’s dark head and laughed. “Sorry TJ, Mom said no go on the horror stuff, and the snitch out there is listening.”

“Awwww.”

“How about one of your story books?” John pointed.

Torren glanced at the bookshelf and frowned. “They’re for little kids.”

The boy was growing up too fast. John couldn’t believe he would be nine soon. Time had flown by so quickly. John sat on the chair next to the bed, “Okay, so then how about one with a little blood at the end?”

“Yeah!” Torren gave him a bloodthirsty little grin and slid down under the covers. John noticed he had not yet outgrown his favorite stuffed dog, it was still on the bed beside him, though at a respectable distance from the pillow. Plausible deniability, John supposed. 

“So, once there was this boy. His father named him Besha.”

“Besha is a girl’s name!” 

John pointed a finger at him. “Exactly. Now, I bet you can see that this caused a whole lot of trouble for poor Besha. He got picked on so much by the other boys that he learned really early on how to fight and he got good at fighting. The girls laughed at him too, and pretty soon, Besha just started staying away from everyone. His father left when he was really little, so Besha couldn’t ask him why he had given him that horrible name. His mother died and then he had no one to care for anymore so he started to wander.

“Besha decided that he hated his father for giving him a girl’s name and making his life so hard and lonely. He never stayed in one place for very long because he never learned to make friends, and he didn’t like telling people his name or about his childhood. As he got older, he started to search for his father, he wanted to hurt him the way he had been hurt.”

“That’s not good,” Torren said.

“No, it wasn’t really. But that’s what happens when you let hate eat away at you. It makes you mean, and it takes over everything,” John patted Torren’s leg through the blanket. “So Besha started looking everywhere for the man that had given him that terrible girl’s name and ruined his life. The hunt took over everything. He looked in every tavern in every town he went to.

“Then one day, he found him. He carried a worn and ratty photograph in his pocket that his mother had thrown away, and he knew the man there was his father. He walked right up to him in the bar, fearless and mean as ever and he said, ‘My name is Besha.’ And what do you think he did?”

“He killed him?” John’s bloodthirsty little audience asked hopefully.

“Well, he tried. He punched him square in the face and then they fought. They tore up the whole bar, broke the furniture, and crashed through the window. They were both covered in mud and blood and neither was winning the fight for the longest time, they were so evenly matched. But then Besha got in a really good hit and the old man went down. 

“He was beaten and he held up his hands and said so. He could see that Besha meant to kill him. ‘You should thank me, before you kill me,’ he said. And that confused Besha enough that he put down his knife to listen. ‘You just fought a hell of a fight,’ the old man said as he coughed up blood - John always had to add extra blood to appease Torren - ‘and I don’t blame you for hating me and wanting me dead. This world is a hard one, and I knew I wouldn’t be there to make you strong enough to survive in it.”

Torren’s eyes were drooping, but he was fighting sleep to hear the end of the story. “So, I gave you that name and I left, because I knew you would have to get tough, it was that name that helped make you strong.”

“Ohhhh,” Torren said sleepily and smiled. 

“Yep, so Besha didn’t kill his father. He helped him up and they shook hands and then went their separate ways. And Besha eventually learned to get on with people and he married a waitress and settled down. And when his son was born, what do you think Besha named him?”

Torren shrugged, losing the battle against sleep.

“John, of course, a good strong boy’s name. The End.”

“That was not very bloody, John,” Torren complained. 

John tugged back the blanket and tucked the stuffed dog into the crook of Torren’s arm. “Whatcha gonna do? Next time we’ll do zombies.”

“Cool. ‘g night John.”

John kissed his forehead and ruffled his hair. “Goodnight TJ.”

Rodney was leaning in the doorframe with his arms crossed. “You totally ripped that off from Johnny Cash.”

“Classics are the best. Be happy I didn’t sing it to him.”

“Thank you for that.”

~*~

**Torren & Wendy Lorne: Unexpectedly Awake**  
Torren hurt everywhere. He groaned and opened his eyes, expecting to see the muzzle of a gun pointed at his face. Instead, he saw Wendy Lorne’s blue eyes blinking at him, her chin propped on her fists as she stared at him. 

“Are you really awake or just kinda awake?” she asked, tilting her head in that cute way that she had.

“Really awake, I think. Why am I still alive?” He tried to sit up but it was agony moving so he stayed as still as he could instead.

She smiled brightly at him. “Well now, there’s a story to that, if you want to stay awake long enough to listen.” 

He returned the smile and gave a slight nod, he felt woozy but he thought he could stay awake for a while. “Yeah, I’m listening.”

“You should be dead, you asshole,” she snapped.

“That is not the proper start to a story, Wendy.”

Scowling at him, she pointed to his various bandages and then the array of machines he was hooked up to. “By the way, General Sheppard said if you ever pull a stunt like this again, he’ll personally kick your ass. Daddy said you’re on report and Dad said you’re grounded from Gate missions for six months.”

“The story?” Torren knew he was in trouble with the brass, he just had not expected to live to face it. He looked around at the Atlantis infirmary, it had not yet sunken in completely that he was not dead.

“After you went rogue and stole the prototype, Dad scrambled a team and sent us after you. He almost came out after you himself.”

“Lornes always come through in a pinch,” Torren said.

She poked his hand, on a patch of skin showing between bandages. “You’re not getting around me with sweet talk.”

“I disabled the prototype’s tracking device. How did you find me?”

Ignoring his question, she continued. “There were four Blezlin ships on your tail that we had to deal with. Lucky for us we had Reyna along or you might have been toast before you even got there. She took them all out, and she said you’re welcome for that.”

Great, he was now indebted to Reyna Dex, just what he needed on top of everything else. 

“We tracked you to the Blezlin outpost and landed a short distance from the prototype. Reyna, David and I went after you while Megan Sheppard went to get the prototype. She’s pretty pissed at you for tearing up the cockpit, by the way. That’s her baby, what were you thinking?”

“To stop the Blezlin from using the device, that’s what.”

“Well, we got there after you’d done your mischief. Reyna went berserker and mowed down the majority of them while David and I dragged you out. It was a close call, the bomb you set went off not too long after we took off. And we brought your sorry ass back here and that’s the story.”

“How did you find me, Wendy?”

She reached into her pocket and fished out the necklace she had gifted him for his naming day years before, letting it dangle by the chain over his chest. it was a silver Thor’s hammer, a symbol from an old earth mythology. “Remember this?”

Of course he remembered it. And the kiss she’d given him along with it. That had been the night he had really taken notice of her, had seen that she wasn’t a little kid anymore. It had been the start of everything, that necklace. He never took it off. 

“Lornes come through in a pinch because we take precautions. I put a tracking chip on you, in the clasp of the necklace. I’ve always know exactly where you are.”

“Sneaky, Lorne.”

“I have to be, involved with you, TJ.” She stood up and slipped the chain of the necklace over his head, patting the amulet into place on his chest. Then she kissed his lips sweetly. “Go to sleep. I’ll be here when you wake up.”

************************************

**5 Things Radek Zelenka Wished For**  
 **Backbone**  
While things were going to hell, even Rodney, the king of complaining, could pull it together and not be afraid. But Radek had to work at it. He had to force himself to not run and hide. He wished he could be more like Rodney, on those days, when things in Atlantis were scary. He wished he was not always shaking inside.

**Flute**  
Radek missed the music his sister used to make on the flute that had been passed down from their grandparents. He missed his sister too. The two were probably intertwined. When he heard flute music drifting through the corridors late at night, it made him wistful and sad.

**Spot**  
As a child, Radek had never had a pet. His parents would not allow the expense. While in school, at university, there was no time for a pet. Only when he had taken an adult job in Prague, and had a place of his own, was he able to finally have the dog that he had always wanted. He bought a little poodle in a pet shop, and at the suggestion of an American coworker at the lab, named the puppy Spot. He wished he had not had to leave Spot behind to come to Atlantis.

**Pinch**  
There were days when Radek hated Rodney McKay. Just some days, it was not an always type of thing. Some days, when Rodney was being his most obnoxious, Zelenka just wanted to reach over and give him a sharp, hard, bruising pinch. Pinching one’s superiors was not conducive to good job reviews, and so he refrained. But he wanted to.

**Darkness**  
There was nowhere to hide.

Every light in Atlantis shone brightly. Every window streamed sunlight in speckled and dappled glory on the walls and floors. These creatures thrived in the light. He needed a dark corner, a quiet place; somewhere the invaders would not find him while he tried to work out how to block them from key areas of the city. He eyed the grate over his head and he sighed. It looked like it would have to be the ventilation system again.

**********************************  
 **5 Times Lorne and Parrish were Hostages**  
 ** ~~Alarusamesetiachal~~ P75-332**

Parrish pressed his face to the bars, gripping the metal tightly in his hands. “Hey! Is there anyone there?” He went up on his toes, trying to see better. “We’ve got a sick man in here! Hey! Guards!”

“David,” Lorne groaned, holding his hand to his stomach and curling on his side on the wooden bench against the wall. He spun around and after a quick glance at his teammate, grabbed the waste bucket and got it under Lorne’s chin just in time.

A man carrying a tray appeared at the door of their cell. “Oh, no! No more of that slop! You’ve poisoned him.” The food couldn’t really be poisoned, since David had eaten the same things and had not gotten sick, but he figured taking a page from mcKay’s book and going on the offensive couldn’t really make their situation any worse. “ If he dies, not only will you not get the stupid seed you want them to fetch for you, but they will come and bomb your asses back to the stone age!”

The guard blanched, set the tray down on the floor and ran off.

“Too late,” Lorne said quietly.

“What?” He grasped Lorne’s shoulder.

“Not much of a threat. They’re already in the stone age.”

“Very funny.”

Lorne gave him a feeble smile. “I’m hardly at my best. They’ll come for us soon, don’t worry.” He reached over and patted David’s arm.

 

**Genii**  
“I thought they were good guys now?” David asked, twisting as much as his bonds would allow to look over at the Major.

Lorne shrugged, “Who can keep track of their politics?”

“They’re gonna kill us.”

“They’re not going to kill us, calm down. Breathe. You’re going to hyperventilate if you don’t calm down and breathe.”

“I don’t want to die. I’m never leaving the city again. I have seedlings in. Who’ll take care of my greenhouse...?”

“We’re worth more alive than dead, David. Don’t panic. We’ll be fine. Colonel Sheppard will come for us.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because it’s his turn. I did the last cavalry run. Now, take slow deep breaths, in and out, that’s it, nice and calm. Don’t give another thought to the nasty radicals with the guns.”

 

**Quap**  
“I have to what?”

“Dance.”

“Or...”

“The gods would be displeased and we would need to find a way to appease them.”

“Which would involve?”

“A procession up the fire mountain to make an offering.”

“What kind of offering?”

“Your friend would do quite nicely, Major.”

“Dance you say?”

“Yes.”

“Hand me the grass skirt.”

 

**M43-901**  
“I’m pretty sure they won’t trade with you, my people are pretty firm on the policy of not making deals with terrorists.”

“Terrorists? We are not terrorists. We are businessmen. We trade what we have for what we want. In this case, we trade you for the supplies we need.”

Lorne wrinkled his nose and shook his head. His nose itched, but with his hands cuffed behind him, he couldn’t scratch it. It was making him a little nuts. “Yeah, well, if you’d wanted some food or medicine or something harmless, they might have gone along with it to humor you and make nice. But no way are you getting explosives. Not going to happen.”

His captor pressed his lips together tightly and stormed away, leaving him tied to the chair. Evan tried to rub his nose on his shoulder, but the rope around his throat and looped through the rungs of the chair prevented him from moving very much at all.

A scuffling near the doors caught his attention and he smiled as he heard familiar voices. His team had come back for him! He saw Stackhouse roundhouse one of the guards and Cadman took out two others. He had a moment of panic when he saw a guy advancing on Parrish as he was crossing the room, but Cadman hit the guy upside the head with the butt of her P-90.

“Are you okay?” David asked as he ran up to Evan and knelt down, reaching for the ropes.

“No, damn it, scratch my nose!”

Smiling, David obliged, and Evan leaned into the touch with a relieved sigh.

 

**Nashville**  
“Put your face on the floor and quit your yammerin’!”

“I don’t believe this!”

“You should probably shut up and keep your head down, David.”

“This was supposed to be a vacation.”

“It is still a vacation, now it’s a vacation with a bank robbery in the middle of it.”

“We should do something.”

“No, because then it will be a vacation with a bank robbery and paperwork in the middle of it. The locals have it under control. We need to have faith in our local authorities, David. Besides, I’m unarmed.”

“But they have guns! You have skills, take one of theirs.”

“You there! Shut the hell up.”

“You won’t get away with this!”

“David, shhhh, shut up! Don’t antagonize the goon with the gun pointed at you.”

“I don’t want to die on vacation, that would suck. And if you know if you get shot by one of these guys, you will never live it down.”

“Sure I would, eventually.”

“No, you wouldn’t, because I would make sure to remind the marines every day how we spent our time in Nashville, getting shot!”

“I said shut up over there.”

“Are you going to let him talk to me like that?”

“Yup. Because...”

“Holy! Did you know that would happen?”

“Yup. Every time he yelled at you he took a few steps closer. Hopefully, his buddies will move into the line of... amateurs. Well, that’s that. Hopefully, it won’t take long to give our deposition to the police and we’ll make it to the Opry in time for the show.”

“My legs won’t hold me. He was going to shoot me. Hold me up.”

“Hey, no kissing in public. I wouldn’t have let him shoot you.”

“Oh, yeah? How would you have stopped him?”

“I have skills.”


End file.
